Baltic Fury

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All Forums >> [New Releases from Matrix Games] >> The Operational Art of War IV >> Mods and Scenarios >> Baltic Fury

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Baltic Fury - 11/25/2018 11:39:30 AM

StuartG

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Been working on this one for some time. There are still flaws, and I could do with some input on whether the scoring in particular is working right.

Its 2020. Russia decides to invade the Baltic states, and NATO must defend long enough, till it can get adequate combat power in place to push them back. For Russia, it has to move fast. Very fast. If it leaves it too long, NATO will put too many combat units in places to push them out the way, and their airpower will quickly erode under NATO bombardment.

I dont claim its fun. I built it purely to test out a 'what if', and it features a custom series of units. Its based on real world information, and its as close as I can get to both sides orbat as I can find at the moment. Please let me know if there any problems, and Ill try to fix them.

Attachment (1)

< Message edited by StuartG -- 11/25/2018 11:46:08 AM >

Post #: 1

RE: Baltic Fury - 11/26/2018 12:46:25 PM

bswermeling

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Wow, this is quite detailed. Everything looks about right. There are of course different assumptions that can be used about what such a scenario could be like, but this is all a reasonable situation. I also like the work on the terrain. A different scenario called Baltic Tempest has it as mostly flatland or cropland. It is good to see the terrain is heavily wooded like the real location. I wrote a research article about this topic a short while ago and was very interested in playing a wargame version of it.
congrats
bw

(in reply to StuartG)

Post #: 2

RE: Baltic Fury - 11/27/2018 10:00:45 AM

StuartG

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Thank you for that. Believe it or not this IS actually Baltic Tempest that I started around 1999 or so. I substantially altered the map because I wasnt happy with it either. If anyone wants to use it for any other scenarios, such as set in Belarus, then Id be happy if they would give me a reference. I dont believe its quite so accurate as far as Poland, but I was rapidly losing the will to keep going by then. And to be honest, if Russia is overrunning Poland to any degree, you are probably going to lose anyway.

Its got an edited unit detabase. I took out some of the overpowered stats for weapons like BMP3 (like, whom is going to use an ATGM, 100mm gun, 30mm gun AND 7.62mm gun at the same time?) but I upped in some of the stat for mortars and and 2S7, so you can get defence erosion effects. Some of those were either missing or a little skewed.

Ive been having trouble with aircraft carriers. I altered the stats of them, and after that, aircraft wont deploy on them. If its still happening, Ill probably create a seperate deployment area for the air wing. There is an open question whether carriers would deploy in the Baltic at all.

I cant say ive played it through fully to completion, so if anyone has the will to wade through it, please let me know how it goes on. Perhaps reducing the turns to game end might be an idea, but I had the wacky idea people would probably want to play it through to the end.

Have fun anyway.

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Post #: 3

RE: Baltic Fury - 11/27/2018 11:22:06 AM

Oberst_Klink

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quote:

ORIGINAL: StuartG

Thank you for that. Believe it or not this IS actually Baltic Tempest that I started around 1999 or so. I substantially altered the map because I wasnt happy with it either. If anyone wants to use it for any other scenarios, such as set in Belarus, then Id be happy if they would give me a reference. I dont believe its quite so accurate as far as Poland, but I was rapidly losing the will to keep going by then. And to be honest, if Russia is overrunning Poland to any degree, you are probably going to lose anyway.

Its got an edited unit detabase. I took out some of the overpowered stats for weapons like BMP3 (like, whom is going to use an ATGM, 100mm gun, 30mm gun AND 7.62mm gun at the same time?) but I upped in some of the stat for mortars and and 2S7, so you can get defence erosion effects. Some of those were either missing or a little skewed.

Ive been having trouble with aircraft carriers. I altered the stats of them, and after that, aircraft wont deploy on them. If its still happening, Ill probably create a seperate deployment area for the air wing. There is an open question whether carriers would deploy in the Baltic at all.

I cant say ive played it through fully to completion, so if anyone has the will to wade through it, please let me know how it goes on. Perhaps reducing the turns to game end might be an idea, but I had the wacky idea people would probably want to play it through to the end.

Have fun anyway.

Had a first look at your impressive work and also recommended it to military analysts via #Twitter.

https://twitter.com/OberstWKlink/status/1067114525906866176

Klink, Oberst

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RE: Baltic Fury - 11/27/2018 12:14:22 PM

StuartG

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Thank you, thats very kind.

I think if I did it again, id do the scale differently. I also think the 12 hour turns probably have made it more lengthy than it warrants. Still, if there are any easy changes, please flag them up, Ill try to make time for them. Id prefer not to do any more units for it though for various reasons.

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Post #: 5

RE: Baltic Fury - 12/1/2018 3:18:12 PM

bswermeling

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I agree that the 12 hour turns might make it more manageable. What I am curious about is why there is no list of of reinforcements? Unless I did not download the file wrong it does not show US forces or anything else arriving.

Also, why are most units 1/1 in terms of their stats? It seems like there is not a large amount of variation there.

Finally, what reason made you decide on a scenario that starts with subversion and "hybrid war?"

Again, nicely done scenario

(in reply to StuartG)

Post #: 6

RE: Baltic Fury - 12/1/2018 9:55:04 PM

r6kunz

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Looks good and quite timely. Thanks for posting.

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RE: Baltic Fury - 12/3/2018 2:55:00 AM

r6kunz

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Are you familiar with "Occupied" (Okkupied), a Norwegian series, with a similar thread?

"Although there�s plenty of action and intrigue on the show, whose premise echoes both the Nazi occupation of Norway during World War II and Russia�s recent intervention in Ukraine, it�s primarily concerned with moral questions. When a powerful foreign regime seizes control of your country, at what point must you start fighting back?"

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Post #: 8

RE: Baltic Fury - 12/3/2018 8:51:55 AM

StuartG

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No ive not seen it. Ive certainly heard of it of course.

In a similar theme I was trying to have a long period of green man style incursion, so you could have much more of a low intensity conflict going on. The problem is, the longer it went on, almost certainly NATO would deploy. And as soon as it starts putting a lot of boots on the ground, the best window for a successful redfor attack goes out the window. So its a compromise. The earlier version had a trigged Redfor response when blue attacked 'demonstrators' (green men). But it gave unreliable results and I had to take it out.

I hope nobody takes exception to the potential politics in this. Its just a scenario that Im all sure we hope will never happen.

< Message edited by StuartG -- 12/3/2018 8:53:05 AM >

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Post #: 9

RE: Baltic Fury - 1/4/2019 11:07:46 AM

cathar1244

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This should be interesting to look at. One thing Poland has implemented in response to "green men" tactics is a territorial militia (many battalions) to inhibit initial territory loss as much as possible.

on edit ... getting a message that my version of TOAW IV can't load the scenario? Which version of TOAW are you using?

Cheers

< Message edited by cathar1244 -- 1/4/2019 12:09:05 PM >

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Post #: 10

RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 3:35:59 PM

cathar1244

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Confusion here. It appears others can open the scenario in the .zip file. I can't ... and using a hex editor to compare its content to that of other scenario files, it looks considerably different than scenario files that I can open. For one, there is no header in the file that [apparently] identifies which version of TOAW created the file. Any recommendations or ideas appreciated.

Cheers

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Post #: 11

RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 5:24:50 PM

larryfulkerson

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There's two files in the Baltic Fury package: an SCE of course and an EQP. Here below I have
posted an unzipped version of the EQP file. Just take the dot txt off the file name so that
it's an EQP. file. The next post below will be the SCE file.

Attachment (1)

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 5:25:28 PM

larryfulkerson

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Here's the SCE. Same drill about the file name.

Attachment (1)

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 6:14:07 PM

cathar1244

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Larry,

Thanks. I had the same issue. I conclude it has something to do with my version of TOAW IV. Do you know if the scenario file format changed with the last patches (*20, *21)?

Cheers

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Post #: 14

RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 6:23:45 PM

larryfulkerson

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quote:

ORIGINAL: cathar1244

Larry,

Thanks. I had the same issue. I conclude it has something to do with my version of TOAW IV. Do you know if the scenario file format changed with the last patches (*20, *21)?

Cheers

I know that the 0.21 version won't read files from earlier versions. So I'm guessing that yes, the format changed.

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 6:26:30 PM

cathar1244

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Thanks again Larry. I'll assume the scenario designer used 0.21 at this point.

But your comment raises another question. If 0.21 won't read files from earlier versions ... doesn't that invalidate a huge amount of older scenarios, or did I misread your comment?

Cheers

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Post #: 16

RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 6:39:54 PM

larryfulkerson

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quote:

ORIGINAL: cathar1244

Thanks again Larry. I'll assume the scenario designer used 0.21 at this point.

But your comment raises another question. If 0.21 won't read files from earlier versions ... doesn't that invalidate a huge amount of older scenarios, or did I misread your comment?

Cheers

I'm sorry, I've confused you and I didn't mean to. The SCE files can be read by either version, it's just the PBL's, the game files, saved game files, that it won't read if it's an earlier version of game engine that created it. So those PBEM games that started with the 4.1.0.4 version can't use the 4.1.0.23 version for that game.

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 7:09:07 PM

cathar1244

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Larry,

Got it, thanks yet again. I'm still not sure why my version won't load it, although the file header of Baltic Fury.sce is radically different from what I see with scenarios made in 2017. I need to find other recently created scenario files and see if the same condition holds.

Cheers

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/6/2019 7:17:13 PM

cathar1244

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Okay, I looked at a hex dump of Bob Cross' Chickamauga scenario; it resembles the Baltic Fury scenario in terms of file header. So it looks like the format of the scenario files has changed quite a bit since the late 2017 version of TOAW IV. I guess I'll wait until the issues with the patches settle down and then patch to the latest version.

Cheers

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Post #: 19

RE: Baltic Fury - 1/7/2019 9:36:40 AM

StuartG

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Sorry you are having problems Cathar, I hope you have it working now. I can confirm its developed from TOAWII and TOAWIII, so there may be some issues. Ive not had any problems personally myself though.

Incidentally, if anyone can point to good sources for the Polish Army, or indeed, anything ive got badly wrong, im happy to produce an updated version to make it as accurate as possible.

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/7/2019 6:22:54 PM

cathar1244

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quote:

ORIGINAL: StuartG

Sorry you are having problems Cathar, I hope you have it working now. I can confirm its developed from TOAWII and TOAWIII, so there may be some issues. Ive not had any problems personally myself though.

Incidentally, if anyone can point to good sources for the Polish Army, or indeed, anything ive got badly wrong, im happy to produce an updated version to make it as accurate as possible.

Thanks StuartG. By chance today I realized the newer scenario files are actually in .zip compressed format. I was able to unzip the Baltic Fury scenario file, but it still would not load in my .11 version of TOAW IV. I'll just have to apply the latest patches at some point.

Not sure if you're aware of this bit. You may find it of use. https://www.offiziere.ch/?p=30704

Cheers

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/8/2019 8:54:55 AM

StuartG

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Thank you, Id not been keeping up with the development of Polish Territorial Forces.

It probably warrants putting in. Ill certainly do so at some point, when I can find some more details on the TOE of how its setup, what equipment it has etc.

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RE: Baltic Fury - 1/8/2019 11:32:28 AM

cathar1244

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quote:

ORIGINAL: StuartG

Thank you, Id not been keeping up with the development of Polish Territorial Forces.

It probably warrants putting in. Ill certainly do so at some point, when I can find some more details on the TOE of how its setup, what equipment it has etc.

I haven't seen anything at that level of detail, but I imagine they're mostly light infantry with perhaps some infrastructure experts in the manner of the West German Wallmeister units of the Cold War. One option to represent them would be guerilla units, but that could miss the mark. My impression of their mission is to prevent any advance by "green men" until the Polish regular forces arrive.

Cheers

(in reply to StuartG)

Post #: 23